Bang (Blast Brothers #2) - Sabrina Stark Page 0,92
every once in a while, Brody brought some into the office.
I'd even tried a few. You know, for politeness.
Arden stopped in the main living area and sank back into my favorite armchair. She motioned to the chair across from her and said, "Sit."
I ran a multi-billion-dollar company. I'd practically raised my brothers, and Willow, too, while I was at it. I wasn't accustomed to being ordered around, and didn't appreciate it now.
I gave her a hard look. "No."
"Fine," she said. "Then you can stand there while I tell you what I just learned."
I didn't like the way that sounded. "It's not about Cami, is it?" My stomach clenched. "Is she alright?"
"I'll get to that," Arden said.
Screw that. "No. Tell me now."
Arden rolled her eyes. "Well she's not dead in a ditch if that's what you're wondering."
The image alone was enough to make my blood run cold. "So she's alright?"
"Yes," Arden said. "Just like she was an hour ago when you called Brody to check on her."
I stiffened. "That's not why I called."
"It was, too, and you know it." She made a scoffing sound. "Oh sure, you pretended like you were checking for Willow's sake. But we all know."
"You know what?"
"The same thing you know, if you'll ever admit it."
I refused to go there. "So Cami – she's alright then?"
"More or less. She's on her way home."
Was she? I looked toward the driveway.
Arden said, "In case it wasn't clear, I meant her family's home in Petoskey."
Right. I knew that.
When I looked back to Arden, she added, "She left town maybe thirty minutes ago."
I frowned. "Driving what?"
"My SUV."
I didn't ask what Arden would be driving in the meantime. Brody had plenty of vehicles to go around. But I was curious. "So tell me, did she get her things?"
"You mean the things that magically appeared on our back deck sometime in the middle of the night?"
"Maybe," I admitted.
Yesterday, after everything had gone to hell with Cami, I'd been a busy guy. I'd had both damaged vehicles towed to the shop, and then I'd purchased a new vehicle on the fly – a heavy duty pickup with its own snowplow.
Afterward, I'd gone out searching for Cami's purse.
From Brody, I'd heard about those two assholes tossing the purse out the window maybe a mile or two from the mall.
I'd started at the mall and worked my way back, walking most of the way. In the blowing snow, it had taken me hours to find it.
But I had. From what I could tell, nothing inside had been taken or damaged, including Cami's cellphone.
I'd boxed up the purse, along with the rest of the things I'd pulled from the smashed SUV. Finally, just before dawn, I delivered all of it to Brody's back deck.
Arden said, "The plastic sheeting was a nice touch."
Before leaving Brody's deck, I'd covered the stacked boxes with plastic to make sure that Cami's things remained free of snow.
But to Arden, my only reply was a noncommittal shrug.
She continued. "And it's funny that somebody – and we all know who that somebody was – did all of this in the middle of the night. During a blizzard. When normal people would be hunkered down in their homes."
"Yeah, well…some people aren't normal, are they?"
"If you mean yourself, trust me, you're gonna not get any argument from me – which brings me to the reason for my visit."
"Which is…?"
"I know what you did – and I don't mean recently. I mean six years ago."
Shit.
In a careful voice, I said, "Oh, yeah? What's that?"
"You kept me out of trouble."
I knew what she meant. During Brody's senior year of high school, there'd been a weekend explosion in the chemistry lab, resulting from the unfortunate combination of a gas leak and Brody's disposable lighter.
The gas leak hadn't been his fault, but the flame from the lighter? Oh yeah, that had been Brody's doing.
The explosion had happened on a Saturday afternoon, and Brody hadn't been alone. He'd been with his lab partner – the same girl who happened to be sitting in my living room right now.
I told her, "You're wrong. I kept Brody out of trouble."
After the explosion, Brody and Arden had been suspended, but there'd been talk of more serious ramifications – maybe a lawsuit, maybe criminal charges. Maybe both.
The whole thing was utter bullshit – which is why I'd applied pressure here and there to anyone who thought it was a good idea to railroad two minors for a freak accident.